Researchers Incorporate Silicon into a Living Organism: is this the Building of a Bridge between Man and Machine?

‘Silicon is the second most common element in the Earth’s crust, after oxygen. However, aside from its non-organic use by certain sea sponges and microorganisms, very little silicon is used by Earth’s biology, despite making heavy use of other common elements, such as carbon, hydrogen, iron, magnesium and oxygen. This has presented a long-standing puzzle for scientists: why would nature ignore such an otherwise useful substance?
While artificial methods of binding carbon and silicon have been available for some time, researchers with the California Institute of Technology were curious to see if they could get an organism to produce the same result, as a product of its metabolism. They selected the gene for producing an enzyme that could accomplish this from a bacterium, Rhodothermus marinus, that lives in Iceland’s hot springs, and introduced the involved DNA into a strain of ordinary E. coli bacteria.’
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